


Ruin

by Blue_Sunshine



Series: The Desert Storm [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Force Bond (Star Wars), Gen, Genocide, Jedi Culture, Mandalorian Culture, Master & Padawan Relationship(s), Padawan training, Tatooine Slave Culture, Trade Federation, Violence, Yam'rii, kalee
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-23
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-11-28 09:32:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18206681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blue_Sunshine/pseuds/Blue_Sunshine
Summary: Sometimes, where we come from matters less than where we are going.





	1. Chapter 1

“Obi-Wan, your master is terrifying.” Bant complains, leaning into his side as they, and a great many other Jedi, observed the spar taking place in the open salle.

Master Naasade, a relative unknown, if shrouded in mystery, had developed a reputation for approaching any passing Jedi and inquiring after a spar. Some knew that he often stepped in for lightsaber instruction, some did not.

Master Windu, though he often assisted Naasade in teaching Obi-Wan the Seventh Form, much to Obi-Wan’s dismay, would not spar in public with him. He suspected that Naasade knew the seventh, but no one was certain. No one was certain of anything about Obi-Wan’s master, since he appeared out of the black five months ago.

Master Qui-Gon, who often frowned and sighed at Ben’s warm-and-cold attitude towards him, often sought him out for a spar and was soundly avoided each and every time, for all that Naasade seemed to enjoy his company when they both deigned to trounce the new and largely disapproved of Padawans Sabacc League.

Master Yan Dooku, when Naasade had caught him in the temple, had assented to a spar, on the grounds that Ben wanted a proper example of makashi to show Obi-Wan (who had not been thrilled, for all that it had been an amazing combat to witness). Every time Obi-Wan was given a demonstration of a new form, it was added to his repertoire to practice, and thus Obi-Wan’s demanding physical regime never seemed to get any easier, for all that he got better.

Master Pong Krell, however, was another story. Obi-Wan’s Master sought the besalisk out regularly, and Krell regularly accepted. Only…only Ben was _always_ just slightly better than Krell, always _just_ good enough to beat him, for all that Krell got more aggressive and impressive each round. They went weeks between rounds, and Krell clearly sought to improve himself to win, and just…never could. To Obi-Wan, who was the only person in the temple who might claim to actually know something of Ben Naasade, it almost seemed like Ben was making a point, every time he forced Krell to submit, like he was playing with him, by dangling victory always just out of reach. Deliberately. And Obi-Wan knew it _was_ deliberate, because it was so _easy_ for Ben to do.

His master, Obi-Wan thinks, could destroy any opponent he wished to. There was something about the way he fought, the way he moved, the things hiding in the depths of his eyes that whispered to Obi-Wan a warning. Some people saw it – Master Tahl, who had stopped confronting Nasaade about Obi-Wan’s training and instead simply started absconding with Obi-Wan on occasion – always approached him cautiously, and with something like concern in her gaze for all she disagreed with him. The Council members all watched him out of the corners of their eyes, and Obi-Wan had noticed that Healer Ni Hiella always flinched when his Master came up to her, even though her Padawan didn’t seem to notice anything wrong.

But there was another side to that gravity he held, because Obi-Wan had also seen his Master in the creche, letting younglings smear paint in his beard and falling asleep in piles of toddlers. He’d seen him instruct the initiates with such care and patience, and when he meditated, it felt like all the world fell into order around him, and Obi-Wan just wanted to bask in that surety.

They’d been Master and Padawan for months, and Obi-Wan felt as if he barely knew the man at all, and yet wanted nothing more than to be everything Ben looked at him and promised he could be. Even when he was so physically exhausted he couldn’t stand up, even when his mind was so wrung out he couldn’t form a coherent sentence, even when his senses were so stretched that reality seemed to waver, and even when he dived so deep into the Force he started to forget himself, when he swam through flashes of time that didn’t exist and probably hallucinated at least once, he _wanted_ the promise Ben believed in when he looked at him, and he told himself; get up, answer, focus, _feel_. And he did it all over again.

The other Padawans often snuck pitying glances at him, and most other training masters shot Naasade dirty looks, and sometimes he caught the knights and initiates glancing between them with fascinated horror when Ben led a staggering Obi-Wan back to their quarters, or when Obi-Wan was trying and failing not to collapse into his dinner, or when he was in class, and he blinked back at the teacher because he wasn’t entirely sure he even knew what language she just asked a question in. But Obi-Wan didn’t complain. Out loud, at least.

He hid his master’s tea, rigged the ‘fresher to pure cold water sometimes, when he was feeling particularly bitter, and stole his master’s monochromatic but absolutely divine comforter to take naps with, however, because not all languages were made up of words. He had to vent somehow.

But Bant was right. Master Naasade was terrifying, and, once again, he was leading Master Krell neatly into defeat. Master Pong Krell, who had four arms and two lightstaffs and could easily trounce more than half the knights in the Temple even when they fought him in pairs.

“Master Tholme thinks he was a Shadow.” Quinlan says, dropping down onto the bench at Obi-Wan’s other side. “It makes sense.”

“I still think _someone_ would know who he was.” Bant replies skeptically. “No one can even name his lineage.”

Both his friends shoot a look at Obi-Wan, at that, and he flushes, because he doesn’t know either.

“Master Tahl thinks he might have been raised by another sect.” Bant comments after a moment, where Naasade slips seamlessly from soresu to ataru to djem-so, weaving between Krell’s staffs, leaping over the besalisk in a Force assisted jump, and then pressing him down after an aerial turn, sabers crashing violently. “You know, like the Altair.”

“No.” Obi-Wan says. “He was raised here. He knows the Temple better than anyone I’ve ever met.”

“I heard some of the knights saying he might be a reformed Darksider.” Quinlan whispers, leaning in.

“No!” Bant shakes her head. “If that were even _possible_ , there’s no way they’d let him take a padawan!”

“But think about it!” Quinlan presses. “The way he fights, the fact that no one knows who he is, or who trained him. Even his record makes no sense.”

“What?” Obi-Wan questions, though a denial was on the tip of his tongue.

“His Temple record. It’s brand new, for one, but that’s not news. The weird thing is, is it claims his homeworld is Concord Dawn.” Quinlan says.

“So?” Bant asks, looking skeptical.

“So, Concord Dawn is a _Mandalorian_ world.” Quinlan sighs, sounding put-upon. “There hasn’t been a Mandalorian Jedi in six hundred years, and it’s not that they don’t produce Force-sensitives.” He drawls the last. “It’s that we’ve fought on the opposite sides of wide-scale conflicts for centuries. Their warrior class were _trained_ to kill Jedi.”

“Mandalore _has_ had a revolution. Or five.” Bant points out. “All their warriors were cast out, remember?”

“Yeah.” Quinlan snipes back. “To _Concord Dawn_. And get this, his name? Naasade, that’s an old Mandalorian word. It means ‘No One’.”

“For outcasts, it was.” Yoda interrupts, startling Quinlan into yelping and Bant into smacking Obi-Wan’s shoulder, while Obi-Wan jumped. “Outcast, he is, is he not? Whisper, you do, but understand, you do not.”

“We’re sorry, Master Yoda-“ Bant tries, but he only shakes his head.

“Curious, you are.” He admonishes gently, and then peers at the fighters, where Ben has relieved Krell of one staff, which causes Yoda to shake his head. “No one, he calls himself, because no one, he believes he is.”

“He’s not no one!” Obi-Wan protests hotly, and blushes, but then Yoda tips his head approvingly at him. Obi-Wan takes a calming breath. “Master, why _don’t_ I know who my grandmaster is?”

“Hm.” Yoda grumbles. “It matters not, who your father was. Matters, only the father _you_ shall be. A Mandalorian proverb, that is.”

Obi-Wan swallows at the implications inherent in that, and wonders if no one knows where his master came from because his master was ashamed.

“He’s not a darksider and he’s not an outcast.” Obi-Wan declares firmly. “He’s _my_ master.”

“He’s still terrifying!” Bant blurts, as Pong Krell is forced to admit defeat once again.

“True, that is.” Yoda smirks.

~*~

Shmi watches the water in the fountain ripple and smooth over, reflect the younglings playing on the level above, and float the petals of a flower that has bloomed out.

She feels the thick, curling grass beneath her, still so strange and vibrant after a lifetime of desert, and can taste the moisture from the rain cycle nearing to start. The gardens are quiet, save for the last few youngling clans still running about, and the sporadic masters meditating deeply after supper. Beside her, Shaak Ti lounges against a mossy rock, legs stretched out before her, ankles crossed, not meditating, but looking supremely relaxed as she leans back against the stone, her silver eyes tracking the dart of a fish beneath the pond, with all the natural instincts of a born huntress.

Shmi has felt like prey all her life, but the togruta, her friend, has never made her feel afraid.

Shmi sighs softly, letting her fingers explore the soft fronds of the vegetation, and trying to let her body relax as well. “You have asked to become my teacher, and while I am honored, I do not know how to answer you.”

Shaak Ti is quiet for a moment, eyes still tracking the fish, though Shmi can sense her attention in the same way she has always been able to feel moonlight on her skin. “If you do not wish to, you do not have to answer me at all.”

“Is that fair?” Shmi inquires, and once there would have been no place for _fair_ in her life, but that was a slaves life, and she is no longer a slave.

“What do you mean by that?” Shaak Ti inquires curiously, letting her eyes turn towards Shmi.

“You are a teacher, and there are many who would be your student.” Shmi says, saying nothing outright, and Shaak Ti understands nonetheless.

“I would not hang forever in the uncertainty, as there would come a time when I would decide for myself wat your answer was, and move beyond the possibilities held between us.” Shaak Ti says calmly, her voice as smooth as running water. “But it is not yet that time.”

Shmi breathes in deeply, letting the air lift her chest and fall out like a tide.

“I cannot convince you, Shmi.” Shaak Ti speaks again, after another long moment of simple, easy quiet. “This is your decision, whatever you should decide, but if you have questions, please do not fear to ask.”

“That is not what I fear.” Shmi replies quietly, feeling a coil of dread in her stomach and a press of reassurance on her mind, a certainty in the air off the water that tells her this is where she should begin.

Shaak Ti waits, her focus on Shmi, who finds steadiness in that silver gaze.

“There a thousand ways to be enslaved.” Shmi finally says, voicing that dread deep in her belly, in her bones, in the shadow of every memory. “By debt, by chains, by transmitters, by drugs, by the promise of love, by the illusion of choices…” Shmi sighs again, short and tight, and repeats herself. “There are a thousand ways to be enslaved.” She repeats.

 _But a hundred thousand ways to be made free_. Shmi can hear her mothers voice, whispering in memory. And not just her mother’s voice, but all her mother’s voices. Nuna Skywalker, Mee’ameeli, Kania Whitesun, Ma Jira, and so many countless others behind them, who told them the tales they told Shmi, and Shmi has told her own children, the one born to her and the many who weren’t. _There are a hundred thousand ways to be made free._ It was the promise of Liea, of Ekkreth, of Ar-Amu.

There is a frisson of that promise in the air, as the rain cycle starts softly, a whisper of fine drops on leaves and balconies, and the quieting of younglings chased back to the crèche.

“I fear to accept what you offer, Shaak Ti, because you do _not_ know me. I have hidden myself, and I am hiding still. But I think…I do not want to always have to hide. I do not want to always be afraid. May I introduce myself to you?” Shmi asks.

Shaak Ti tilts her head, studying her face, and Shmi tries not to hide, Shmi focuses inward, and for once, lets her tight grip on shadow and quiet and _see-me-not_ slip free, slowly, like a beru blossom unfurling at sunset.

“That is your choice, but I would welcome it.” Shaak murmurs, well aware of the promise and the gravity in the Force around them, whispering _listen_ , whispering _this-will-be_.

Shmi takes another breath, and lifts her chin, and meets the huntress with her gaze.

“I am called many things by many beings,” She declares quietly, but firmly, “But _I_ am Shmi Ekkreth, She Who Walks the Sky and Sees the Way. My face is Ekkreth’s face, and my heart is Ar-Amu’s heart, and I am Amavikka, as was my mother before me, as will be my children after me. I would tell you a story. Will you hear it?”

Shaak Ti has leaned forward, pulled in by the intensity with which Shmi speaks and holds herself. “I will.” She dips her head in respect. Shmi licks her lips, and presses her trembling hands deeper into the grass.

“There are as many Ekkreth stories as there are slaves on Tatooine, which is to say, there are stories without number, and more every day.” Shmi says, with the air of practice. “This is the first of them. In a desert long ago…”

~*~

The look measured upon Master Naasade by Knight Adi Gallia was one which would have made Obi-Wan bow and politely retreat, to bother her nevermore.

Master Naasade, of course, seemed impervious to such looks.

“I feel, Master Naasade, that you failed to comprehend the details enclosed in the senate’s request.” Gallia intones flatly, setting her stance and crossing her arms, firm as the peaks of Alderaan. “As I can see no other reason you would seek to volunteer yourself and your _very young_ padawan to accompany the senatorial envoy into wild space, to a war-torn system, and a planet currently experiencing a _violent_ _genocide_.”

“I understood the details.” Ben replies calmly, earning the tholotian’s controlled and yet so very evident ire. “And I will not be retracting my offer from the Senate committee, which they have accepted.”

“Your offer to the senate committee, which you did not put through proper channels, else I would have seen it before they accepted and promptly discarded it with due prejudice.” Gallia growls. “What about your padawan? Does his opinion count in the matter?”

“He’s been very eager for the chance to leave the Temple.” Ben replies, holding his ground as he knows that attempting to side-step Adi Gallia is a good way to end up on the floor.

“The Council may not be interceding on the matter, Naasade, but I am not oblivious to your mistreatment of that boy. If he gets hurt, if he _dies_ on this mission, _I_ will take it out of your hide.” Gallia vows, and steps around him, stalking away before Ben can respond to the accusation.

Ben sighs, letting his head fall back so he can stare up at the tiled ceiling. “I am not _mistreating_ my padawan.” He whines.

“You and every other sentient alive has a differing opinion on that matter.”

Ben groans. “Master Tahl, such a delight.” He turns to face the unimpressed noorian, offering his customary grimacing smile. “Are you well? I heard the Melida/Daan affair was…difficult.” He looks her over, and is relieved that her green-and-gold striped eyes are as vibrant and focused as ever, and though she has a few scrapes, she is otherwise intact. He had quietly suggested to Master Yoda that Tahl not go to Melida/Daan alone, and so she had been accompanied from the first by Qui-Gon Jinn, and he is glad to see that his history of tragedy did not so easily repeat itself.

“Eventually I shall regain my hearing on the left side and the full rotation of my arm.” She replies. “But we managed to reconcile the Old and the Young, so yes, I am well.” She looks satisfied, bruised or not. “Though that might change; what did I just hear Knight Gallia snarling about? You’re dragging Obi-Wan into a _genocide_? That’s no beginners mission!”

“I don’t intend to _throw him onto the field_ , Master Tahl.” Ben retorts. “We’re merely accompanying the senate committee’s envoy to verify the situation at hand and determine how to proceed.”

She does not look any more impressed with that explanation, and Ben resigned himself.

“And how much verification are you going to do with your lightsaber?”

“I’ll have you know I’m an accomplished negotiator.” Ben replies tartly.

“I’ve seen you lose arguments with a three year old.” Tahl deadpans, mouth curling up on one edge.

“You have to let them win sometimes.”

“Do you.” She quirks a brow, and then the amusement falls away. “You may be getting away with how you treat Obi-Wan here because there are always eyes on you two and he hasn’t ended up in the Infirmary, but if you don’t take more care out there, you _will_ lose him.”

“Is everyone here under the impression that I somehow fail to care for my padawan?” Ben snaps. “I am only trying to make sure he survives.”

“Survives what?” Tahl practically explodes, he anger boiling out in the Force. “Kriffing hells, you act like you’re going to send that boy off to fight the _Sith_!”

Ben bites down on his first snarling reply, because she has hit too close to the truth, the truth the Jedi don’t yet know and don’t want to accept.

“I am not training him to fight the nightmares of a long forgotten era.” Ben says darkly. “But there are things out there which none of us are prepared for.” He forces his vision to clear, shoving back his own flickering nightmares which are memories which are traps still waiting ahead of him in time.

Tahl anger dissipates, still hovering in the air, but not seething, and her eyes soften with some piteous understanding. “I don’t know what you have lost,” She murmurs. “but he isn’t you. His life is not your life, his path not your path. You need to let go of those fears.”

Ben breathes deeply and then stops breathing, because if he lets it out he’s going to scream. Instead, he dips his head with the barest grace to courtesy, turns on heel, and strides away.

~*~

Shaak Ti trills a sharp, angry note and glowers at the computer terminal in frustration. Nothing, there is nothing, not one thing, coming up in the archives relevant to her search.

Breathing in sharply, Ti rises and walks away from the terminal, reminding herself that frustration is a useless emotion, for all she feels so much of it of late.

“Master Ti?” Madame Nu catches her attention, watching her with concern, and Shaak Ti forces her emotions to flow away, to smooth over her thoughts the way the river smooths over jagged stone. “May I help you with something?”

“I can’t find what I’m looking for in the archives.” Shaak Ti admits, for which Madame Nu purses her lips thoughtfully, but mostly feels amused. “Have you ever heard of the Amavikka?” the togruta master inquires.

Madame Nu frowns, and there is a sharp snap to their left, which makes them both whirl defensively.

The zygerrian knight who stands there looks just as shocked as they do, staring at the data disk in their hands which they had just cracked in half. “Terribly sorry, Madame Nu.” The knight mutters sheepishly.

“Terribly sorry?” Nu repeats, aghast. “Look at the damage you’ve done! Give that to me! Now! And leave! I don’t want to look at you while I deal with this – this carelessness of yours. No respect at all for the sanctity of our collective of knowledge!”

The zygerrian knight bows his head and meekly does as he is bid, but he catches Shaak’s sleeve as he passes her and gives a tug in an unusually forceful bid for her to follow. Shaak Ti frowns at his back, bows her departure to Madame Nu, and follows hastily, the hunt in her blood.

Once they exit the Archives, he whirls on her, green eyes sharp and piercing against his dark grey fur. His ears twitch, as do muscles in his face, and then he turns away again and stalks off without a word. Shaak Ti pursues, the Force like a breeze at her back, nudging her forward.

He leads her several corridors away and finally into a private study room, his presence in the Force full of tension and curiosity and brittle-sharp hope. When the door seals, he faces her abruptly, hands deliberately pulled behind his back so as not to threaten her with claws. “Who taught you that word?” He demands, sharp and unyielding, and Shaak lifts a brow, because this is a Knight and she is a Master.

“Is it taboo?” Shaak Ti asks instead of answering. “I was unaware.”

He glowers at her, though there is a small gleam of cautious understanding as he forces himself to calm down, studying her own placid face. Both of them are hiding something.

“It is sacred.” He says. “And it is not a word that belongs to you, Master. Who taught it to you?”

“Sacred?” Shaak knew Shmi had been displaying more trust in her than perhaps she had earned, but the way he responded spoke of such depths of meaning that she did not comprehend.

“Not like gods or holy places. Not even the Temple.” He replies, voice measuring out as he reels in his emotions, his anger. “To those that word belongs to, it is more sacred than life itself. It’s…” He frowns, trying to explain, but unwilling to lower his shields and _show_ her. “It is a piece of glass, sharp and fragile, and that glass is the connection between you and the Force, and you are handing it over to someone else. Sacred as that is sacred.”

Shaak Ti cringes in spite of her self-control, a primal fear stirring deep in her bones at the mere idea.

“We do not give it away.” He says coldly. “We hold it within ourselves, and we defend it with everything we are. I have seen children bite through their own tongues rather than give it up.”

“What _are_ the Amavikka?” Shaak Ti asks.

“Tell me who taught you the word.” He demands in return. Shaak Ti leans into the Force, and the Force whispers of potential.

“She introduced herself to me as Shmi Ekkreth, called Skywalker, who walks the sky and sees the way.” Shaak Ti finally relents. The knight smiles at her for this, and touches his fingers to his heart and then his lips, as Shmi had when they had parted for the night.

“And did she tell you a story?” He asks.

“She did.” Shaak Ti confirms. He relaxes.

“Why did she tell you a story?” He asks.

“To save my life.” Shaak Ti replies, sensing the formality in this just as she did when Shmi finished the tale.

 _I tell you this story to save your life._ She’d been gripping Shaak Ti’s hand, dark eyes wells in her pale face. _Will you remember it?_

“And I will remember it.” Shaak Ti adds, feeling the Force whispering just beyond what she can hear, a thousand voices echoing a thousand repetitions, an unending chain from one storyteller to another, and on and on it went.

“Then you have been set on the path.” He says, eyes gleaming with satisfaction. “Do not turn away from it.”


	2. Chapter 2

“Well, padawan, what do you think?” Ben asks, settling himself next to his padawan on the long couch lining one corner of the ship’s lounge, datapad in hand, another four piled next to Obi-Wan, who was curled as tightly into the corner as he could be.

“I think that the representative from the Neimodian Sector keeps watching me.” Obi-Wan replies, flickering a glance in Art Bode’s direction. Bode’s metallic-red eyes shift, and the padawan simmers with suspicion.

“That is because he knows better than to watch a full-fledged Jedi Master, and we make him nervous.” Ben replies, amusement trickling through their still distressingly weak bond. “Now, your opinion on the reports, if you please.”

Obi-Wan chews on his lip for a moment, fingers tapping on the datapad. “I think we have a lot of information regarding the Yam’rii, and next to none at all about the Kaleesh invaders. We have all these reports and documents, but the information is entirely one sided. It’s biased.”

“And?”

Obi-Wan squints at his master, wondering what he’s missed, his neck itching where he can feel the gaze of Representative Bode once more. It clicks, the other odd thing about the Yam’rii plea to the Republic. It wasn’t submitted by the Yam’rii.

“And it was the Trade Federation who pled the case in the Senate. The Yam’rii aren’t even a part of the Galatic Republic, but they clearly have connections.” Obi-Wan adds.

“Yes, and how very fortunate for them, isn’t it, that a Neimodian Representative was one of the _randomly_ selected officials tasked with establishing contact and deciding whether or not to intercede in their crisis?” His master leans back, looking very relaxed and casual as he offers a pleasant smile to Bode, who flinches and turns away from them from across the room.

Obi-Wan eyes the Neimoidian’s back. “You’re saying they made sure they had a hand in the decision. They’re not supposed to be able to do that. It’s not fair.”

“Politicians are rarely fair, Obi-Wan.” Ben chides lightly. “They’re _politicians_. But what can we surmise from their heavy-handedness?”

“That this is important to them.” Obi-Wan states the obvious. “They have something at stake in the outcome.”

“And?” Ben prods, as he always does.

“And…it means things may not be as they seem?” Obi-Wan tries, and is rewarded with a fond tug on his padawan braid.

“Exactly.”

~*~

Kirsk, the capitol city of Tavorski, and not yet under attack by the Kaleesh, is a lot of organically shaped structures, domes and rises and bowed tunnels, prominent greens and yellows letting the city blend into the terrain when viewed from above.

The Yam’rii are a tall insectoid species, and they tower above the delegates with bulbous-eyed heads on long, tapered necks, and their cutting-bladed-forearms were a passive threat every time they moved.

Lu Soorn, the Kel Dor ambassador, was the only one of the four representatives that seemed unbothered by the species, but that may have been because it was difficult to parse any Kel Dor’s expression behind their masks.

The final two representatives, excluding Master Naasade and Padawan Kenobi, was a Chalactin Junior Senator, Yudrish Sedran, and Quermian delegate Pollum Winn.

Obi-Wan, next to three separate species of great height, felt very small.

Obi-Wan startled when his master placed a hand on his shoulder, stopping him just before they followed the others inside, and looked up at Ben, who quietly pointed over the edge.

“Do you see that field?” He inquired casually, and Obi-Wan peers across the view offered from the landing platform. Trees, jungle, hills, rocky field.

“A graveyard?” He inquired, squinting to try and make out the shape of the stones, some of them too level-edged to be natural formations.

“Yam’rii don’t practice burial.” Ben reminds him.

Obi-Wan nods at the reminder, wondering what new test this is – because he always, always felt as if his master was testing him – and breathes in. Holds it. Out. In. Drawing his focus to just this one sense, and augmenting his vision with the Force.

“Ruins?” He asks, when he can better see the shapes and scope, and wondering how his master saw it at all, in just a casual glance.

“Yes. Ruins.” Naasade comments, and then passes his padawan by and walks inside. The others have not waited for them.

Obi-Wan frowns, rubs at his aching eyes, and jogs to catch up.

The Yam’rii elected a single individual, Speaker Sedek, as a liason with the Senate Envoy, and it was clear that even he did not enjoy the role. The other Yam’rii took notice of the delegates, but otherwise did not seem to wish to interact with them at all. It was trait of xeno-centric species, Obi-Wan knew. They had asked the republic for help, yes, but they weren’t pleased about their presence here.

Speaker Sedek’s grasp of basic is very limited, and they spend much of their first meeting going back and forth with a protocol droid translating between them. Sedek’s most convincing argument to the plight of their people, however, is holo footage.

Villages burning, refugees camping out at the edges of the city, the dead lying in the streets, and a single clip of the Kaleesh themselves, frightful and lethal, cutting down Yam’rii citizens with sharp-edged shoni spears, or lig swords, or firing slug-throwers into a huddle of panicking Yam’rii.

“This must be stopped!” Bode boomed, slamming a hand down on the table. “It is clear they act without conscience!”

Some of those Yam’rii had been younglings.

“They take no prisoners, offer no parole, no surrender?” Lu Soorn inquired, calm in being, but her aged presence agitated in the Force.

“They do not.”

“Have they communicated at all?”

“They do not.” Sedek repeated.

Obi-Wan has been silent. He is an observer here, and plays no part. His Master has also been quiet, watching the holos play over and over, listening to the debate on casualties and resources and relief efforts, on the enemies movements and numbers and tactics, on the necessary force required to push them back.

“Why?” Naasade finally inquires, and the delegates startle a little, having forgotten he was there, falling into familiar patterns of arguments that exits within all Senate actions.

“Why?” Lu Soorna repeats, confused.

“Historically speaking, across the galaxy, true genocide is perpetuated for very specific reasons. The first is religious orthodoxy. The second is zealous speciesism. The third is retaliation of a perceived harm.” Naasade lays out the reasoning, with all the calm and gravitas expected of the Jedi. “So what precipitated this event?”

Sedek’s blade-limbs click as he shuffles, speaking to the droid, which translates. “They have attacked our colonies and driven our people away from valuable resources, and now they have come for us.”

“Greed.” Bode spits. “A bid for territory without contest of the rightful possessors!”

“A possible explanation.” Naasade tips his head. His voice and expression give nothing away, but Obi-Wan can feel the doubt his words create. “You did not answer me, Speaker Sedek. What were the relations between your peoples prior to this campaign?”

“Does it matter?” Delegate Pollum Winn inquires. “Clearly, the Yam’rii are under siege, and their people are dying. We can investigate the cause, certainly, but after we’ve dealt with the violence.”

“Dealt with it how?” Naasade inquires.

“A proposal has been put forth to send for fifty Jedi and a compliment of Judicial Officers to put a stop to the violence.” Winn replies. “It is not an unreasonable request, given…well.” The Quermian tips his head to the image now on the holo, of the younglings cut down in the street, of the huddled Yam’rii facing a firing squad. Winn’s sorrow and disquiet with the violence is clear, and a powerful motivator.

“The Kaleesh will not stop.” Sedek says. “They must be put down.”

“The Republic is not here to retaliate for you, Speaker Sedek. We are here to offer only our assistance in preserving your people.” Lu Soorn cautions.

His blade-arms click, and the Yam’rii does not reply.

“If we are at an impasse, perhaps we should break and rest for awhile.” Naasade offers the room. Bode glares at him, but Soorn and Sedran nod agreeably, Sedran looking deeply troubled. This is one of the young Chalactin woman’s first extra-Republic negotiations, and no matter what they do, there will likely be more bloodshed before they are through. “Speaker Sedrek, will we be joining you for a meal? It is customary in such arrangements for the hosts to provide.” He smiles, and Obi-Wan does not like that smile. It’s pleasant, it suits his master’s face, and somehow it is still a sneer. How no one else can tell, Obi-Wan doesn’t know, but his master is clearly viscerally opposed to the Yam’rii. Obi-Wan just doesn’t know why.

“The Yam’rii are a predatory species, Master Naasade.” The protocol droid chirps. “Their diet may be unpalatable for your species.”

“I’m an omnivore.” Naasade replies implacably. “Provided the meal is not outright toxic to my digestive system, I would be very pleased to sample what the Yam’rii have to offer, though I cannot speak for my fellow delagates.”

Speaker Sedek sways a bit, not unlike Quermian tend to, when in thought. “Arrangements will be prepared,” The droid reports. “if you wish to rest in your rooms. The Yam’rii hopes that soon you will have settled the matter, so that their people come to no further harm. It is quite dire.”

“Yes.” Naasade replies evenly, eyes glittering. “It is.”

~*~

“Master?” Obi-Wan questions, when they are alone in the quarters the Yam’rii have given them. They are open in layout and rather entirely unadjusted for human occupancy. “Why did you volunteer us for this mission? The senate did not request a Jedi accompaniment.”

“They did not.” Ben nods to his apprentice, lowering himself to sit on a wide, curved bench that was a little too tall. “And yet the proposal Delegate Winn spoke of to deploy fifty Jedi to quell the violence was already written in offer, should the committee agree to such course of action. They wanted us to intervene, but did not offer us any oversight regarding that decision.”

“But they accepted when you volunteered.”

“They had little choice in the matter.” Ben explains to him, idly stroking his bead. “If they refused our request, it would stand to reason we might refuse theirs if it came to it.”

“That’s why Representative Bode keeps watching us, isn’t it?”

“He did not want us here.” Ben nods again, hands falling to his lap and he leaned forward on his elbows.

“So there _is_ something wrong.” Obi-Wan concluded, crossing his arms. “They’re not telling us the truth.”

Ben smiles. “No, they aren’t.”

Obi-Wan hesitates, his next question on the tip of his tongue, but the steady gaze of his master prompts him to ask. “How did you know? About the Yam’rii crisis and the proposal and that there was something wrong with the whole thing? Did you have a vision?”

His master is quiet a moment, still watching him steadily. “Of a sort.” He sighs, brushing nonexistent dust off his knees and sitting back upright. “Have you ever heard of Galidraan?”

Obi-Wan frowns, something familiar about the name but nothing solid in his memory. He shakes his head.

“Galidraan was…” Ben pauses, presses his lips together, shakes his head, and tries again, anger rising and dispersing almost as quickly as it came. Obi-Wan fidgets, nervous now. “It started as a proposal much like this. The Jedi were called to the planet by the governor, claiming the True Mandalorians were slaughtering his people.”

“Were they?” Obi-Wan asks, wincing internally a he recalls that technically speaking, at least as far as anyone is aware, his master _is_ Mandalorian.

“No, but another Mandalorian faction, the Death Watch, to whom the governor was loyal, made certain that the Jedi did find bodies and bloodshed. I won’t explain the difference in their ideologies now, but suffice to say…the Jedi made a grave error that day.”

“What happened?” Obi-Wan asks, feeling in his heart that he probably doesn’t want to know. But feeling in the Force that he might _need_ to.

“When confronted, the True Mandalorians resisted arrest, knowing a trap had been laid for them. A skirmish ensued, violence broke out, and the Jedi… _slaughtered_ the True Mandalorians, while the Death Watch laughed as we did their dirty work for them. Mandalore is still in conflict due to what happened that day, and to this day, they have received no recompense for our actions.”

“…all of them?” Obi-Wan asks, disbelieving that the Jedi could…could…

“All but one.” Ben murmurs, gaze cast away. “Jango Fett, the last _Mand’alor_.”

Obi-Wan swallows against the tightness in his throat, angry and horrified, uncertain and unbalanced. His master looks back up at him and holds out a hand. Obi-Wan forces his fingers to unbend, realizing they were clenched tight enough to ache, and steps forward, letting his master catch him and pull him in by the hand until they were nearly nose to nose. Ben leans forward until their foreheads touch, and closes his eyes. Obi-Wan copies him, and can feel his Master’s Force-presence wrap around his own, sheltering, comforting, guiding. He doesn’t chastise Obi-Wan for his emotions, doesn’t tell him to let them go.

Obi-Wan sucks in a few deep breaths, telling himself it happened, telling himself he can’t change it, telling himself that if he knows, and now he knows, he can make sure it doesn’t happen again.

“That’s why we’re here.” He says, pulling back so he isn’t breathing on his teacher’s face. “To make sure what happened at Galidraan doesn’t happen again.” He can feel the crawling feeling beneath his skin recede, and his emotions settle. They’re still there, but they aren’t screaming at him, and he can deal with them later.

He can feel pride blossom over the fragile bond between him and his master. “Yes, padawan, that’s why we’re here.”

~*~

Ben knows his padawan is worried, not only about this mission and the shadows at play behind it, but about him as well. Ben is trying to keep the tension in his bones trapped inside his own skin, trying to keep the vicious, pointed temper of a GAR General held at bay, but it is so much harder than he remembers it being.

This world feels familiar. He had stepped from his ship and into the air and everything in his blood and his instincts had said _I know this place_.

Ben had never been to Tovarski. Never been to Kalee, even. But that didn’t matter, because this world was like all the other worlds bathed in blood and treachery. Tovarski was Melida/Daan, was Mandalore, was Naboo, was Christophsis, was Umbara, was Utapau, was Mustafar, and a hundred upon a hundred other battlefields. It was a veneer of civility over the ruins of what once-had-been, rife with the tide of _fury-despair-hate-fear_ that pulsed through the Force from the Yam’rii and Kalee alike, and underneath that…an invisible hand, insidious and untraceable, carving out a path for them to unwittingly follow, step by step towards destruction.

Ben must ensure they stepped off the path.

It was clear the Yam’rii did not entertain guests, but the protocol droid, at least, seemed to have ensured no one would be _unintentionally_ poisoned at the table. It wasn’t a compatible height for many of the delegaton and so suitable stools had to be found for each of them, but the spread was lavish enough. At the Head of the table was the Yam’rii leader, and on either side of him for three seats were the Chieftains, and then Sepaker Sedek, and then the guests. The opposite end of the table was left empty, as no one was meant to be equal to the Yam’rii Chief of Chiefs.

That empty place, of course, is where Ben moves his padawan to. The Yam’rii chitter and click in agitation. The droid does not translate. The delegates glare at Ben, and he merely smiles passively at them, and retakes his own seat.

The table is laden with roasted meats; brightly colored, fuzzy-skinned fruits; a soft, spongey cheese shmere; and eggs, ranging in size from cups of miniscule fish eggs to bowls of soft yellow eggs smothered in herbs to large, pink, globe-like eggs each held in individual chalices, accompanied by small dishes of sauce, and a spoon for scraping out the raw insides.

“Does this satisfy custom?” Speaker Sedek asks, translated by the droid.

“This is exactly what I was looking for.” Ben replies, watching a droid server place one of the chalice’s before Obi-Wan, as he had been seated across from the Chief of Chiefs, and protocol then dictated he receive the best of the best. His padawan had looked consternated by the meal before-hand, now, he stared at this supposed delicacy in horror.

“What – is –“ Obi-Wan stutters, and then bites his lip, shooting a nervous look at the delegates, and the table full of Yam’rii, and then his master. His expression smooths over, and he turns the chalice in his hands, cupping the bottom half. “Might I ask what this is?” He asks, clearer and seemingly less affected.

“Your padawan’s first state dinner?” Sedran whispers, sounding amused. “He should be glad it’s not an Ubesean Spirit Day Feast. I’m never accepting an invitation again.”

“Anything would be preferable to what they have just set before us.” Ben replies casually, and Sedran blinks in surprise, and turns towards him fully.

“It is _hu’rama_ , Young Jedi.” The protocol droid answers him. “A delicacy.”

“What is _hu’rama_?” Obi-Wan presses, and Ben pushes encouragement and resolve towards his padawan, who is radiating grim determination, disgust, and a trickle of tightly controlled fear.

“Do not offend our hosts, Padawan Kenobi!” Representative Bode speaks up, shooting uneasy glances between guests and hosts.

“Fresh egg, served with syrup or sauce.” The protocal droid answers him once more.

“Egg of what species?” Obi-Wan continues, and the Yam’rii chitter, Speaker Sedek bowing his head under the angry hisses of the Chiefs.

The protocol droid looks at the egg, and then back at the padawan.

“It is Kaleesh Egg, Young Jedi.” The protocol droid replies, and all the delegates from the Senate freeze in their seats, each eyeing the chalices on the table, horror rising up like a fog. Obi-Wan nods, and finally does as he has wanted to do since he sat down, and scoops the live egg out of the chalice and tucks it protectively against his body, the light of the life within it dim in the Force, but not yet diminished completely.

“This will not stand.” Lu Soorn rumbles, her voice rising from the deep of her chest, hands pressed flat to the table. “The Republic does not and will never condone the cannablism of another sentient species, regardless of how that species had retaliated. Speaker Sedek, tell your leaders we will be re-evalutating our position here quite severely, and though we may yet hope to stop the violence, this will _not_ resolve itself in your favor.”

“You cannot condemn an entire planet due to cultural practices – never, in Republic history, have we flat out refused aid without at least offering a chance-“ Bode protests, panting, which is his species equivalent of sweating.

“Cultural Practices!” Sedran exclaims, angry to her bones.

“Delegate Bode!”

Ben, while they argue through their shock, lifts the remaining eggs on the table with the Force, and he and his padawan retrieve them. The Yam’rii do not intervene, but they watch, multi-faceted eyes quite calculating, and they hiss and chitter and Ben has a very bad feeling about that.

“Obi-Wan, we must get these eggs back to the Kaleesh.” Ben hurries his padawan from the dining room – but not far. He has a duty to protect the delegates as well, and the Force is singing _danger-danger-danger_.

He is glad that Obi-Wan wore his robe, as Ben passes over the Kaleesh eggs as carefully as he can, brushing over each small life with a pulse of the Living Force, willing them strength. Two of them barely fit into the largest pockets on the robe, two go in Obi-Wan’s hood, nestled between his shoulders, and the last remains in Obi-Wan’s hand, pressed to his torso. His other hand holds his lightsaber hilt. “You must.” Ben revises, cursing himself for the display and knowing he had no choice but to reveal the deception openly. It had felt like the right course of action, it _was_ , as it allowed for no confusion among the delegates, but it placed them all in danger. “Go to the Kaleesh. _Now_. I must look after the delegates and attempt to contact the Council.”

“Master-!” Obi-Wan protested, a snarl of emotions and doubts in the Force, which Ben tried to smooth away with gentle pulses of trust. He tugged on Obi-Wan’s padawan braid.

“Be safe, Obi-Wan, trust in yourself, and in the Force.” Ben says, nudging the boy, and strides back into the dining hall, listening to Obi-Wan’s hurried step as he dashes away.

~*~

Obi-Wan was not going to let himself panic, he was not. His master was terrifying, and clever, and always certain. He would be _fine_.

Obi-Wan, on the other hand…

The jungle seemed to whisper and shift around him, his quick, Force-enhanced steps just barely scuffing the ground as he sped to the east, where reports had claimed the Kaleesh presence was strongest. He can feel the violence in that direction, the _hate-fury-despair-fear_ that ran like rivers from the spring of war. It wasn’t night yet, but under the dense canopy, it may as well have been. Obi-Wan let the Force guide him, shifting around trunks and vines and twisting roots that he could barely see, catching flicker-flashes of creatures as he passed them by, flowing through the jungle like a fish flows through the river current, letting the path take him, instead of taking the path. He’ll never complain about blind sense training with his master ever again, no matter how many bruises it gave him, and how humiliating it felt to lunge into walls, or clip off of pillars, or be tripped by an unexpected kick to his ankle and fall sprawling to the floor.

To sense a blaster bolt fired your way while blind was something five year olds could learn, but then, even a training bolt sung of _danger-threat_ in the Force. The passive environment, however, much more difficult to feel the shape of.

 _If the Miraluka can achieve sight in absolute blindess, padawan, so can you._ His master told him. _We all touch the same Force._

That didn’t explain _how_ the Miraluka achieved it, given they were born blind and the ability came to them naturally, but Obi-Wan’s master never doubted his capability, even when Obi-Wan wished he would if only so he could then _give up_.

But he didn’t, and so Obi-Wan didn’t.

The deeper into the jungle he gets, the less he fears discovery by the Yam’rii, and the quieter the warning in the Force grows. He fear dissipates, and his senses expand a little more. The jungle lives around him, but it’s not like the Temple gardens. These roots go deep, through layers of rich soil and bands of sand. The water is slow and lazy and he can’t feel either end of the rivers, the way you can feel the cycle of the water in the Room of a Thousand Fountains, one channel flowing from top to bottom and back around again. Something large and sinewy turns in the water. Small, limber-limped creatures swing among the branches, and reflective eyes watch him. The canopy reaches and reaches, each plant finding its patch of light, layers upon dense layers of foliage. He can sense it all in his minds eyes, like an afterimage burned into his retina, brighter when he closes his eyes, thrumming with the Force, light, pooling around him, clustered even on spores in the air, and dark, sunk beneath the roots, decomposing flesh and bone and rotten leaves into base elements, and turning into light again, as it feeds the trees.

The five eggs he’s carrying shine brighter still. They’re slightly tensile, though he’s careful not to jostle them too hard, less the shell splits or punctures, but he can feel movement in the one he has pressed against the soft of his belly. A protective surge of fury flashes up, at the thought of what the Yam’rii had done, and would have done, and it carries him onward with purpose.


	3. Chapter 3

At first, the Yam’rii don’t seem to understand why the senate delegates are upset, and even once that matter is settled, it takes a great deal of argument and translation to realize that they will not be receiving the Republic assistance they were promised.

Ben had quietly urged the delegates not to make that press that fact with the Yam’rii, and was soundly ignored. They refuse to recognize the danger they’re in because they believe they are protected as Republic Envoys, and beyond that there is a Jedi with them.

When the Yam’rii guards rise up around them and take them hostage, Ben surrenders rather than risks their lives.

“This will only make matters worse for your people.” Ben warns.

“Hush, Jedi!” Bode snaps, trying to placate the Yam’rii. “Don’t listen to him! We can still get them to send Republic forces!”

“Bode, are you out of your mind?” Sedran exclaims, only to be knocked down by the Yam’rii towering over her.

“We listen.” Sedek says, multifaceted eyes narrowed.

“We will report back to the Senate that the Kaleesh have attacked the envoy, and killed the Jedi. They will retaliate swiftly!” Bode says.

“I will not do this.” Lu Soorna says firmly, refusing to cower. “The truth will come out about this Bode, no matter how deep the Trade Federations pockets.”

“We can say, Senator Soorna, that the Kaleesh killed the Jedi _and_ the Kel Dor representative.” Bode replies thinly.

“Let there be no bloodshed.” Ben says. They have made him give up his saber and he did so without protest. He does not want to provoke the Yam’rii into cutting them down.

“Are we not too late for that?” Pollum Winn utters quietly, still shocked by the discovery of his own vulnerability.

“You should cooperate with the Yam’rii.” Ben says. “It is the wisest course of action left to us.”

“They want to kill you!” Sedran cries out, still on her hands and knees on the floor, looking disheveled and more irritated than hurt.

“No.” Ben replies, pushing the suggestion through the Force as best he can with minds so foreign as the Yam’rii. “They only want me to be _out of the way_.” Surrender is his best option for buying time without getting anyone hurt. Obi-Wan is on his way to the Kaleesh, and Bode will call in more Jedi. All Ben needs is to be able to get the message through to them that the enemy is not who they think.

The Yam’rii chitter among themselves, blade-arms clicking and clicking.

“We will keep the Jedi.” Sedek says. “Call your Republic.”

Bode bows, and Ben reminds himself that everything is going according to plan, when a heavy strike from behind renders him unconscious.

~*~

Obi-Wan stumbles from dense jungle right into an open valley an hour or so after dawn, and the realization that he’s through, that he’s been running all night, sends him wobbling to his knees and sinking into the grass. He can see the shapes and domes of a settlement down the valley, and taste smoke in the air, though nothing is still burning. Death throbs from it, like a wound in the body of the world, and _violence-hate-more_ bristles over every life-form he can feel.

Obi-Wan can feel overworked muscles spasming in his legs, and now that he’s not channeling the Force to push himself along, his lungs are burning and he wants nothing more than to curl forward and pass out in the sandy grass. Spots blink in his vision, and he realizes he may not have a choice in the matter.

 _I can’t pass out now!_ Obi-Wan thinks frantically. He has no way to wake himself up, and it would waste too much time. He panics for a minute, before reminding himself that Jedi aren’t supposed to panic, and starts gulping in deep breathes, and then slowing, smoothing them out, deep inhales and long, slow exhales. He shifts himself into a more comfortable position, bows his head, and reaches for meditation. His thoughts slip, and darkness tries to pull him into true sleep, but he carefully pulls himself into his senses, and his heartbeat, and the whisper of a breeze, and the energy all around him, leaning into it to shore up where his own reserves fail.

When he feels refreshed enough to stand, Obi-Wan drags himself out of the trance and does so, wobbling a little at the start.

It hurts, walking, but he can do it, so he does, trudging through the grass towards the settlement, stopping to drink from a cold, clear stream when he passes one by. The cool water quenches a thirst he wasn’t aware was so dire, helping him feel less shaky and more alert. He tries in vain to reach out to his master through the Force, but their bond is still weak, and all he can sense from the other end is that the other end exists and therefor his master is alive. He’d really been hoping that more time on missions with his master would strengthen their connection, but mostly Obi-Wan feels as he always does, that he’s just barely keeping up with his masters shadow, and is still so very…underwhelming, next to the older man’s experience, wisdom, and skill.

He senses when the Kaleesh spot him, the sudden convergence of attention in his direction, and stops walking. A patrol is heading in his direction, and he’d rather wait for them than keep trudging through the loose sand and grass.

There are a couple of high, interesting cries – some kind of warning call – and then they are stampeding up and around him on some six-legged beasts, bristling with sharp, organic spears all pointed in his direction. They jabber in a language Obi-Wan assumes is Kaleesh, and he worries they won’t understand Basic at all, but he has to try.

“I am a Jedi of the Republic.” He says, clipping his lightsaber to his belt both to seem non - threatening and so he can lift the egg in his other hand high enough for them to see. “I have come to speak with you.”

~*~

“Councilors…” Knight Gallia stands before the High Council, a statue of willpower and flesh. “The Republic has requested a force of fifty Jedi to be dispatched, immediately, to quell the violence on Tavorksi.”

“On Tavorski, a Jedi is.” Yoda says. “His recommendation, this is?”

Adi Gallia pauses, closing her eyes briefly and breathing in, steadying herself, quieting the small tendril of guilt in the back of her mind that whispered she had not done enough, and she had not acted well, when she last saw him. “No, Masters. The committee reports that the Senate Envoy was attacked shorty after their arrival on Tavorski.” Another breath. “They report that Jedi Master Ben Naasade, and his Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi have been killed by the Kaleesh.”

Silence, stunned, shocked silence, slowly pervaded by a hum of _doubt-grief-uncertainty-fear_ that Adi does not fully comprehend, and wonders at.

“Agree to the Senates’ request, we do.” Yoda’s ears droop, his eyes half-lidded, glaring at the marble tiles at Adi’s feet. “To Tavorski, the Jedi shall go. With them, I will be. As it seems, I think, this is not.”

“I’ll go with you, Master Yoda.” Mace Windu speaks out, and Yoda nods.

With nothing further, and feeling as if she has been inadequate, Adi Gallia bows, and leaves the chamber. It’s only when she recognizes the burning in her palms that she realizes her nails are digging into her skin.

She did not like Master Naasade, but neither could she have claimed to have known him well enough to truly make that decision, and though she had sought to defend his padawan, she had not known Kenobi any better than in passing either. The loss she feels is not only the death of fellow Jedi, but the death of all the lost potential between them personally, good or ill.

 _I have judged rashly and now there is no knowing if I have judged rightly_ , Adi feels, _and that shames me_.

~*~

The Kaleesh were not quite as tall as the Yam’rii, but they weren’t that much shorter either. Most of them had red-brown skin, dark tusks protruding from their jaw, and other than that, they all wore smooth masks over their faces, rounded at the top, flaring into points in front of their ears, and tapering into a narrow plate over their jaws. Most of the masks were pale and near seamless, giving any group of them together a frightful appearance, like the dark, faceless figures in old spirit-tales used to scare younglings into behaving well.

One of the riders had dropped off her mount to retrieve the egg, her deep, grating voice muffled some by the mask as she barked at her companions. Obi-Wan retrieved the eggs from his pockets, and those too were accepted and passed on to other riders, and he turned and gestured carefully to his hood, trying not to flinch when strangers hands came so close to his neck to take them.

He was shoved from behind once they were removed, and stumbled, only to be jerked up by the back of his robe and gracelessly heaved up onto a mount with another rider, in a saddle and pressed against an armored chest plate which were not comfortable in the least.

The ride was surprisingly smooth, despite his discomfort, and the beasts were impressively fast, the settlement sweeping towards them as swiftly as if they were in a coruscanti speeder.

He was removed from the saddle just as disgracefully, with a crude shove, and they all watched him impassively as he crumpled against the dirt, accidentally biting down on his tongue when he slammed his head.

They cried out across the settlement, more foreign calls in surprisingly high lilt given their deep, grating voices. A pair of swordsmenn run up to them, and they bark back and forth at each other, and Obi-Wan is starting to recognize that they are not angry with each other – the language is just shaped that way.

“Jedi?” He hears clearly. “Jedi come.” A Kaleesh swordsman lifts his blade in Obi-Wan’s direction, making a broad ‘follow-me’ motion with the blade. The female rider, who had first dismounted to take the eggs, pushes his shoulders and follows at his side, cradling the egg she took from him high on her chest, almost at the hollow of her collarbone.

Obi-Wan swallows tightly and tries to keep his eyes on the Kaleesh, and not on the blood on the road, trying not to focus on the smell of the bodies piled in off-streets, or sense the echoes of their dying in the Force.

They take him to the largest building in the settlement, where Kaleesh lounge on the steps and holler out at the sight of him in their midst. The swordsman hollers back and they are let through without violence, though he can feel their gazes on his skin, and the anger – black, dark, hungry anger, writhing inside of theirs.

“Jai Sheelal!” The swordsman called out, and a lean figure neatly tailored but dust and blood-ridden robes turns towards them, earning with his attention the attention of the other two kaleesh he stood with. Obi-Wan had only the very basic details of the species from the mission brief, but he can tell that these three – two males and a female – are leaders – Warlords, among their people. They are not finely adorned or armored, they do not carry anything ceremonial about their person – Jai Sheelal carries a slug-thrower slung across his back, the female dual lig swords, and the other male a spear, but all focus whirls around them, all intent and purpose among the Kaleesh centered here. The swordsman briefly bends a knee and rises again at the attention of Jai Sheelal, and quickly reports in their clipped, low-to-high toned tongue.

Jai Sheelal speaks quietly, asking few questions of both the swordsman and the female rider, and accepting the egg from her grasp with reverence, all before deigning to grace Obi-Wan with a glance. The lines on his mask give it an uncomfortably skull-like look, and his reptilian yellow eyes gleam and narrow. The Kaleesh appear bald, but dress their heads in draping scarves and it gives a similar appearance as hair, and Jai Sheelal’s scarves are blood red, paired starkly with a bone-pale mask, reminding the padawan deeply of the death that was wrought here.

“You are a Jedi? You are…. _little_.” Jai Sheelal regards him, and the female murmurs something that might be laughter. He does not know the word for youngling, Obi-Wan thinks.

“I am a Jedi Padawan – an apprentice. My master has sent me to you.” Obi-Wan says. “We were asked to come to this world by the Yam’rii, who wished for our help in destroying you, but my master discovered why you had come to kill the Yam’rii, and told them no.” It is an extremely simplified and not entirely accurate version of the situation, but they had no protocol droid to translate for them and Obi-Wan wasn’t sure how much Basic the Kaleesh actually understood. He wanted to keep things simple.

“The Kaleesh know the Jedi.” Jai Sheelal tips his head the other way. “Your master has sent you – but where is he?”

“He is with the Yam’rii still. We came here with four others who would speak on behalf of the Republic, and it was his duty to protect them.” Obi-Wan says, trying not to let fear cloud him at the thought of that, at the knowledge of that. His master was still alive, the bond between them, such as it was, let him know that much.

The other two Kaleesh warlords mutter at that, the female peering intently at Obi-Wan, who did his best to project Jedi serenity.

“That was not wise.” Jai Sheelal says. “The Yam’rii are savages.”

“We do what we must.” Obi-Wan retorts, and then bites his cheek to scold himself for it.

“That is true.” The female speaks, tipping her head forward in acknowledgement. “And you came to us with life in your hands. Speak as you were bid to.” She says. “We will listen.”

Obi-Wan glances between the pair, but they seem at ease, no discord between them which might spell disaster for him, should he err, and so he speaks.

“We came here to stop the violence, and though we will not do as the Yam’rii wish, that is still our goal. We understand now that the Yam’rii are in the wrong, and the Republic will not stand for what they have done, but neither can the Jedi allow this genocide to continue.” Obi-Wan says. “I have been sent to discuss what terms you might agree to in order to end this bloodshed.”

Jai Sheelal snarls, raising a heavy-scaled hand. “We will not agree to terms with _Huk_!”

“They began this violence.” The female is calmer, but only just, and her voice grinds coldly, for all that she speaks Basic more clearly. “They have enslaved and brutalized our people for generations. They _eat_ our children, and you think we will show them mercy? You think we will not rid the galaxy of every last rotten husk of them?”

Obi-Wan struggles to find a way to refute her argument which will not get him speared, and wishes his master were here. His master never seemed lost for words, and _he_ wouldn’t be so afraid. “We do what we must.” Obi-Wan repeats, cold sweat trickling down his back, over the tacky, itching peel of the sweat already dried there. “And I am a Jedi, I _must_ try and find a peaceful solution.”

The female turns to Jai Sheelal, and they either discuss his reply or argue over it, both of them gesturing at his person, and he forces himself not to flinch when hands as large as his face come too close to it. He catches her name in the back-and-forth; Lij Kummar.

Obi-Wan waits.

~*~

Ben knows it won’t take the Jedi more than two days to reach Tavorski, once the call has been made. The Yam’rii have locked him and all the delegates aside from Art Bode in a round, pit-like room several levels below the ground; there are dark tunnels here, and work-rooms, and Ben can taste sweat-salt and misery in the air. The holding room is shielded, and he nods to himself as he recognizes the slave underbelly of Kirsk for what it is.

“He won’t get away with this. He won’t.” Delegate Winn kept repeating, half in frustration and half in fear as the quermian paced.

“The Trade Federation has gotten away with far worse.” Lu Soorn replies, her species less afflicted by the confines of subterranean design than the Quermian.

“Has it really?” Sedran inquires, her voice low and disillusioned. The young senator is not having a very easy go of her first foray out into the wild edges of the galaxy she serves.

Lu Soorn offers her a pitying look. Sedran probably can’t tell, given Kel Dor physiology, but Ben can feel the emotion.

They rest and pace fitfully and in turns, Winn seeming downright ill after the first few hours. Shadows occasionally pass on the other side of the shielded doorway, but no slave dares linger or peer too long, not even the former warrior Kaleesh.

“The Republic will figure out the truth.” Winn insists to the walls. “This will not stand.”

“The Republic _will_ figure out the truth.” Ben agrees, trying to track the feel of the day-night rotation of the planet so he can tell how long it’s been. “As we are going to tell them.”

“You think so, Jedi?” Ambassador Soorn inquires, but doesn’t elaborate. Sedran is greatly shaken, to say nothing of Pollum Winn’s nerves.

“I promise you, Senator.” Ben replies, settled against the wall nearest the entrance, feeling his body heat leech into the stone, feeling the sun rise, feeling the anticipation in the Force.

~*~

The atmosphere of the carrier is tense and grim, clouded with anxiety poorly released into the Force. The fifty Jedi chosen were all Knights and Padawan-less Masters, and each and every one of them had been informed of the reported deaths of their fellow Jedi on what was supposed to have been a diplomatic mission.

“If he was who he says he was, if he fought – I don’t want to meet what can kill a man who would have faced that and lived.” Mace mutters quietly to Yoda, who grumbles irritably at him from his perch on a cargo shelf, trying to meditate.

“Unknown, the Kaleesh are not. Warriors, yes, strong and proud.” Yoda says. “But fought beside them in times past, Jedi have, and the caliber of the great enemy, they were not. However, overwhelmed, Jedi can be; but many, we are now.”

“I don’t know.” Mace replies. “He volunteered for this mission, and I don’t like that it went so wrong. If he knew something, he should have told us.”

“Guessing, you are.” Yoda cracks his eyes open, feeling the ship shudder. “Arriving, we will be. Prepare ourselves, we should.”

Around the hold, Jedi glance at each other, each bracing for the jolt that accompanies a drop from hyperspace, and all tense when they feel the planet below, rife with the darkness of death and hatred and fear. Yoda grumbles, shifting as he grounds himself and his fellow Jedi in the Force, letting their strengths shine brighter, and soothing many minds.

Then – then, someone down below, sensing their arrival, does what Jedi should not ever do. The loudest broadcaster in the Order and kriffing well old enough to know better drops _all_ his shields, and _shouts_ into the Force.

 _DO NOT TRUST THE YAM’RII. MY PADAWAN HAS GONE TO THE KALEESH. DO NOT ATTACK THEM_.

Nearly half the knights buckle under the psychic wave, and those that do not grip their heads or moan in pain. Mace Windu grits his teeth, and Yoda, eyes closed and mouth pinched tightly, reaches back.

 _Heard, you have been._ He sends irritably.

~*~

Obi-Wan screams and drops to the ground, hands pressing at his skull, trying to keep the pressure from breaking it as the message washes through, his thoughts on fire and his shields shredded by the storm.

The Kaleesh startle and holler over him, one prodding him with the blunt end of a spear, only to be smacked by a fellow. Obi-Wan makes himself small, in his mind, pulling on every lesson his Master taught him about protecting the essence of himself, drawing further and further back from the world, into his own mind, like a stone falling through a pond until nothing can reach him, or touch him, or hurt him, hiding away there until the ripples fade away, and the surface is smooth, and he feels safe enough to swim back out of the dark.

When he comes to, he has been moved to the hammock in one of the back rooms where they let him sleep the prior evening. He is no longer drowning under the shock of the invasive presence tearing through his mind to make itself heard, but his head is pounding, and he can’t seem to block out the pervasive echoes of violent emotion left in the Force, creeping coldly into his thoughts, which themselves scatter and are hard to shape and follow.

 _Well,_ He thinks glumly. _I guess that’s why everyone always tells me to quiet down._ He really didn’t want to do _that_ to his friends, though he knows he’s given Bant and his other age-mates more than one headache.

Obi-Wan pushes himself up with a groan, alerting the sentry, who calls out to the main room. A minute later, Jai Sheelal and Lij Kummar sweep into the room, Jai Sheelal coming right up into his personal space, laying a scaled hand on his hair and tipping his head up to study him with those bright reptilian eyes. “You were hurt.” He states, feeling highly agitated. His hand falls away.

“The Jedi have come.” Obi-Wan replies, avoiding a more direct answer, one hand pressed to his temple, though he knows it won’t help with the psychic pain. “But they have been told not to attack the Kaleesh.”

“They will come here?” Lij Kummar inquires.

“I – I think they will go to the Yam’rii first, to rescue my master and the delegates. The Yam’rii will be punished for their action, but the Jedi will still try and make peace.” Obi-Wan says, finding looking at her to be difficult. He can see death in her eyes, the reflection of those she has killed already and will kill again, the fierce pride she holds of doing so, and the bone-deep, unanswerable grief for the children they could not save. He can’t shut it out, any of it.

“We will not make peace.” Jai Sheelal sighs, as if put upon by Obi-Wan’s stubbornness on that topic, as well he should be. They went back and forth about it for an entire day, while Obi-Wan tried to explain Republic Law and Jedi mandate and Jai Sheelal listed atrocity after atrocity that Obi-Wan would have nightmares about for years. What had been done to the Kaleesh was wrong, even evil, but he still could not condone the slaughter of every single member of a species, guilty or not. “If the Jedi are to interfere, then we will strike now, before we are thwarted.”

“What?” Obi-Wan gasps. “You can’t!”

“We must!” Lij Kummar replies fiercely. “For our people, for all our sacred dead, for our future, we must do this, that the _Huk_ will never again dare look upon the Kaleesh!”


	4. Chapter 4

“Wake up, my apologies, but I need you to wake up now.” Ben nudged the others awake, Sedran having managed a fitful rest and Winn having all but collapsed from his nerves. Soorn was made of sterner stuff, but she was also old, and the situation at hand was wearing on even her firm resolve.

“What has happened?” Soorn inquires tiredly, having worked with Jedi before and understanding a little of their ways. Her voice rattles through her mask, exacerbating the impression of her weariness.

“The Jedi and Judicial Forces have arrived, Ambassador.” Ben smiles grimly, though she probably can’t see it in the dark. “It’s time for us to escape.”

“Should we not wait for them to rescue us?” Delegate Winn trembles, his hands shuffling on the ground as he tried to gain his bearings. “Is it not safer?”

“Safer for us, perhaps, but not for those who would have to fight through the entire complex of Yam’rii to find us.” Ben explains, reminding himself to be patient. They know nothing of war, not yet.

“You think they will fight?” Soorn inquires. “The Yam’rii? Surely they know this will not succeed?”

“If they don’t know yet, but they certainly will soon.” Ben says. “And I feel that they will fight. They will try to erase what has happened here, and build over it, as they erased whomever inhabited Tavorski, and built their colonies over the ruins.”

“If we must, we must.” Sedran pushes herself up on the ground, standing uneasily, hands spread wide in the way of those who cannot see well in the dark, trying to find their boundaries. “Shall we?”

Ben quirks a smile at her dry enthusiasm. “Allow me.” He offers, and moves to the door. He feels along the inner frame, hands skimming just shy of being electrocuted by the shielding, and feels the slight disconnect where the stone doesn’t quite form with the metal.

Ben slips his senses inside the sliver of space, and then tells himself to expand, as stars do. There is a terrible screaming wrench as the framework crumbles and breaks, and then he yanks it free, the shield sparking and guttering out, leaving nothing between them and the tunnels.

Undoubtedly, dozens of slaves would have heard that. Not one comes to investigate.

~*~

“I can’t let you do this!” Obi-Wan insists, placing himself, once more, in Jai Sheelal’s way. There is blood in the dust on the street, and the sobs that accompanied its making by those who are now dead rattle in his mind. He forces himself not to flinch, not to turn to find those who are crying, because they are not there.

“You cannot stop us, little Jedi.” Jai Sheelal places a hand on his shoulder, and steps around him. Again, barking orders to the gathering Kaleesh, and there are many more of them today than there were yesterday, having been called in for the assault on Kirsk.

“Please!” Obi-Wan shouts, turning to face Jai Sheelal’s back. “If you attack, the Jedi will fight to defend the Yam’rii. People will die! Kaleesh _and_ Jedi!”

“Our people are prepared to die.” Lij Kummar tells him, moving to stand beside her partner. “If yours are not, they should not defend the soulless. The Huk are not worth their efforts, or their sacrifice.”

Obi-Wan screams a wordless frustration – rage and hate that are not his pressing in all around him. “Fight _me_!” He yells. “If all you care for is blood, it doesn’t matter, right? Fight me and – and if I win, then you won’t do this. The Republic will deal with the Yam’rii, they will free your people and make sure this never happens again, just please! Don’t do this.” He begs.

“All we care for is not blood.” Jai Sheelal sighs, staring back at Obi-Wan, whose chest is heaving with the effort just to be. “I do not want to fight you. I do not want to fight your Jedi. They have no part in this war, and it will be a waste. But this is a war my people must win.”

“Through violence? Through genocide? Killing their children makes you no better than they are!”

“I am no _Huk_!” Jai Sheelal shouts back at him. “I do this for all Kaleesh! That the Huk may never again hunt our people, never again tear us apart, enslave us, sell us, devour our children!”

“We fight for our freedom, and our future, little one.” Lij Kummar says. “This is our justice, do not the Jedi believe it is deserved?”

“This is not justice. This is revenge.” Obi-Wan shakes his head, and pulls his lightsaber from his belt, grasping it with both hands.

“We will not fight you.” Lij Kummar’s eyes narrow. “You are not our enemy. You have saved our children, and brought them back to us.”

Other warriors bring their mounts to them, and Obi-Wan doesn’t know what to do. He can still barely stand, and all they have to do to avoid fighting him is walk away. He has no power to stop them, but he has to do _something_. He can’t just give up.

He wants to.

He wants to let himself sink to the ground and settle in the dust. He wants to let everything slip away so he’ll stop feeling it, wants to not be responsible for the lives whose deaths are looming above them. He wants to cry.

But he looks up at Jai Sheelal and sees the shadow of his master, as if this were any other day in the salle, and he feels hopeless, and all his master does is look back at him and _believe_. Believe in everything that Obi-Wan could ever be. Obi-Wan _hates_ him for it, sometimes, but every time, he gets back up. He doesn’t give in.

_I do this for all Kaleesh! That the Huk may never again hunt our people, never again tear us apart, enslave us, sell us, devour our children!_

_We fight for our freedom, and our future_.

Obi-Wan pulls in a deep breath, ignoring the reek of bodies beginning to rot, trying to ignore the cold, dark edges creeping into his thoughts, and the emotions that aren’t his. That he hopes, at least, aren’t his. It’s hard, harder than running through the jungle all night long, harder than the endless repetitions of Shii-Cho his master _still_ had him practicing until he could no longer stand, harder than trying to figure out how he was supposed to say goodbye to Bant, say goodbye to ever being a Jedi, but it’s not impossible.

_May the Force be with me._

“I am a Jedi Padawan and a Representative of the Galactic Republic.” Sort of. “I can give you what you want. I can promise that the Yam’rii – that the _Huk_ – will never again hunt your people, never again tear you apart, enslave you, sell you, devour your children. I can promise you your freedom, _and_ your future. Just talk to me. _Please_ , just talk to me. Trust me. I – I know it’s a lot to ask, but it is all I’m asking for.” Obi-Wan pleads.

Jai Sheelal and Lij Kummar turn to each other, unreadable behind their masks and the scattering presence of so many other people that Obi-Wan can’t blot out or sort through, their emotions shouting at him in the Force. After a minute, or ten, they turn back to Obi-Wan.

“How?”

~*~

Despite his primary duty to protect the delegates, Ben does not lead them right up and out of the tunnels. Instead, he follows the call of so many crowded, miserable life-forms and breaks open a dozen cells like their own, shattering shock-collars and shackles with the Force. Like all slaves who have always been slaves, they at first do not believe that they are free. They fear a trick, they are paralyzed by the chance that it is only an illusion, and then, like a tide, they rise up.

He may have just unleashed a bloodbath, but Beru Whitesun did not sit him at her kitchen table when he was more wounded than a man should be and still live, and tell him of Ekkreth and Ar-Amu, of Leia and Lukka, so that he would one day step past the chains of the enslaved while he walked free. She had poured the desert into him, and though he did not know the name of her people, did not share those last secrets and become one of them, he knew what they knew: _The desert is life._

She had saved him. He would save them.

The tunnels writhe and shift with so many bodies, barely visible in the dark, and when Ben knows that those he has freed are capable of freeing those not yet so, he resumes his charge of the delegates, who are so very frightened of the noise and clamor of the slaves. They do not recognize it is the outpouring of joy and relief of those who have at long lasted grasped hope with both hands.

He leads them up a stair and becomes the instrument by which they are harmed when an unexpected blow strikes him center mass, throwing him back down the steps and into the delegates. He gasps, and gasps, trying to heave in hair, and the hand he presses to his chest comes back wet. A little lower, and the cutting-blade arm would have gutted him. He’s lucky his sternum didn’t crack, as he throws himself back to his feet, and throws the Force at the Yam’rii storming down the stairs to finish cutting them down.

It shrieks, high and nearly metallic, and Ben ducks another blade-arm, slicing over his head in the blackness, pulling Pollum Winn down with him, less the quermian be decapitated. Winn cries out in terror. The Yam’rii have no trouble with the dark – but neither does Ben. He has no weapon but himself and the Force, and so he uses the Force, and throws the Yam’rii again, snapping it into the wall with such velocity that its body breaks. It goes against everything Jedi taught to use the Force this way, but Ben and his fellows had unlearned many lessons on the battlefield.

He guides the delegates up, and they never know about the body they cannot see.

~*~

“Ah, kriffing sith damned hells.” Mace Windu disarms a Yam’rii guard with his lightsaber, protecting a fellow knight who is struggling to keep up with their larger opponents. They are trying to avoid any unnecessary deaths, but the Yam’rii’s blade-arms are devastatingly lethal, and they are vastly outnumbered, at least until the Kaleesh start pouring up into the complex, and then there is a confusion of who is on whose side as they attempt to hold ground.

This is, of course, further complicated by the war-party Mace has just been informed of, approaching from the east. The Kaleesh slaves are making weapons of anything they can get their hands on, and every time they down a Yam’rii, they _butcher_ it to make sure it’s dead. The Jedi try to intervene, only to themselves be attacked with fervor. The Yam’rii try to cut down the Kaleesh and the Kaleesh will keep trying to kill them while the Jedi step in to try and save their lives. It’s an impossible situation.

“Guard ourselves, we must!” Yoda calls out. “Hold the landing ground! Hold the atrium! Here, we shall stand.”

He doesn’t know, exactly, why the violence erupted. They had been speaking with Speaker Sedek and Art Bode, discussing what the situation was, asking after the other delegates, and they had been attacked from behind.

And then all hell had broken loose.

He has a feeling he’s going to be blaming Ben Naasade for it. Some way or another, this is his fault.

They do manage to carve out and hold the landing pad and the atrium, the boundary giving the Jedi a chance to rotate out when fighters need to rest. The Kaleesh and the Yam’rii continue to clash, and the Jedi try to siphon the uprising Kaleesh into their safe-harbor to take them out of the fighting, trying to attrition the violence into tapering off.

There are so many Kaleesh, kept as slaves beneath Kirsk.

“We can’t do this forever, Master Yoda!” Knight Alis shouts. “Something has to give!”

“Give, something will.” Yoda replies, knelt beside a moaning Kaleesh to attempt to heal his wounds. Once they are taken out of the fight, the Jedi recognize how very emaciated and deprived the Kaleesh are. Many of them are sallow-skinned, almost colorless, and bone-thin where they should have special reserves of fat for lean times. Many of them struggle with how bright it is outside, having spent far, far too long away from the sun.

There are sharp, high vocalizations on the far side of the landing pad, and Windu turns, bracing for a second wave of attack, hearing the thunder of many, many beasts and fighters. But the thunder slows, and the wave doesn’t crash against them.

A flash of red and grey slides off one of the beasts, and Padawan Kenobi breaks through the ranks of Judicial Forces holding that side of the landing pad, making for Master Yoda.

Mace is supremely relieved to see the young Padawan, and second look quells that relief. He looks…horrid. His hair is greasy with too much sweat, his pallor ashen under sunburn and dust, and a bright burst of red stains his right eye – _oh sweet karking hells,_ Mace thinks furiously. Naasade’s psychic outcry had buckled fully fledged Knights. His padawan was lucky to be conscious, let alone holding it together well enough to walk and talk.

And he’s _talking_.

“- but that didn’t work and I had to do something so I-“

“Hush, hush, Padawan Kenobi.” Yoda lifts a hand, stopping the breathless outburst. “Done well, you have. Breathe, you should, and introduce us to your new friends, you will.”

Kenobi sucks in a breath, and Mace eyes the fine tremors shaking through his body warily.

Two of the Kaleesh warriors have been let through the perimeter, and the difference between them and the freed slaves is all the more drastic.

“Jedi Masters Yoda and Mace Windu, I have the honor to introduce Warlords Jai Sheelal, and Lij Kummar of Kalee.” Kenobi dips to each of them in turn, exactly as he was taught in his Diplomatic Courtesies class. He nearly unbalances as he bows, however, and his voice is hoarsened by his uneven, heavy breathing, both signs of dangerous exhaustion.

“To meet you, an honor it is, and much to discuss, we have-“

“Master!” Kenobi shouts, startling all four of his elders, and the boy darts off with a pull of Force-enhanced speed, as three Knights and Master Naasade charge the delegates through the corridor to the atrium, and out into the open room overlooking the landing pad. The Quermian delegate immediately flops to the floor, stressed beyond measure. The Chalactin and Kel Dor delegates do not collapse quite so dramatically, but they too are worse for wear.

Naasade’s copper saber winks out a bare blink before his padawan slams into him in relief, and both of them topple over, which Windu had not expected. Whatever else he has issue to pick with Ben Naasade, the man is a solid fighter, and never unprepared for a blow to fall.

“Healer!” Kenobi cries, scrambling back on hands and knees, the front of his grey tunic stained gory red from contact with his master.

A Judicial Medic jumps up from a moment of respite and runs across the platform, Windu, Yoda, and the two Kaleesh following quickly after.

Mace bites down an instinctive flinch when they get close enough that he can see a sliver of pale bone through the gaping wound. He has already seen Kaleesh cleaved nearly in half from the strike of a Yam’rii blade-arm, and one Knight had been severed of a hand. For the most part, Naasade’s sternum seems to have taken the brunt, but the gash runs from shoulder to naval.

“Will he live?”

~*~

“It would be a petty way to die, given the things I’ve survived.” Ben complains to the speaker, groaning as his the world swims back into existence. “Padawan, that _hurt_.” He groans.

“S’not my fault you let some bug get the better of you!” Obi-Wan retorts hotly, voice wet with tears.

“Bug? They’re nine feet tall!” Ben protests.

“What’s that got to do with it? You’re a Jedi Master!”

“They got lucky- I didn’t let-“

“ _Lucky_? You have the _Force_ -“ His padawan throws up his hands.

“Will you both _shut up_!” Mace Windu cuts in, arms crossed, looking very peeved. “This is neither the time nor the place.”

Ben glowers at Mace, knowing full well that his padawan is glowering at _him_ , and Yoda is sighing deeply at all of them. Then, he notices –

Qymaen Jai Sheelal.

 _General Grievous_.

A different body, a different _life_ , but the same mask, the same eyes. The medic scowls at him for tensing, for moving, but Ben feels too vulnerable, too weak, lying on the ground with the warlord standing over him.

“Master, stay down!” Obi-Wan pushes on his shoulder, kneeling next to him, and Ben reaches up and grips the boys wrist, squeezing, trying to ground himself. Obi-Wan hesitates at the unexpected touch, and then settles down, looking between his master and the Kaleesh.

“Your little one is a credit to you.” Jai Sheelal nods.

“He is a credit to himself.” Ben replies, and then curses to all nine levels of Corellian hells at the unintended double meaning. Obi-Wan blushes a little, and lets out a huff of breath, looking terribly exhausted. Awful, really.

“He has offered us…a future.” Lij Kummar says. “In exchange for sparing the lives of these soulless _Huk_ and avoiding a conflict with the Jedi.”

“Negotiate on behalf of the Republic, did you, Padawan Kenobi?” Yoda lifts a brow, and Obi-Wan shrinks under his regard. “That authority, you have not.”

“But I do, and his word is my word.” Ben speaks up, and curses himself twice over again. His padawan relaxes with that reassurance, and Yoda grumbles.

“That depends entirely on what he’s said.” Mace points out warningly, arms crossing.

Ben twitches when the medic jabs him with an IV needle. He glowers, but the woman is unrepentant. “Must you discuss this right now? My patient is in need of a blood transfusion and several hundred sutures.” She complains.

“My padawan needs my support.” Ben says waspishly. “That’s more important.”

“It’s not gonna be when you pass out.” The medic argues.

“Then let him pass out.” Windu mutters, just loud enough to hear. Obi-Wan offers the councilor a dropped jaw and a dirty look, and Windu shuffles uncomfortably for it.

“How do you accomplish anything?” Jai Sheelal frowns at all of them.

“ _Slowly_.” Yoda grumbles.

“I can see that.” Lij Kummar remarks wryly.

Ben clears his throat, loudly, and then bites down another groan, because the medic hasn’t hit him with a hypospray for the pain yet, and it hurts. “Padawan, what did you promise the Kaleesh?”

Three planets, four moons, and the entire Yam’rii Fleet, apparently. Every colony world, every advanced outpost, and all the higher-level technology they could strip from the Yam’rii, banishing them back to their homeworld and instituting a blockade to effectively cut off all means of further expansion.

“Their homeworld is self-sustaining.” Obi-Wan explains. “All the extra resources were…well, what the Trade Federation were interested in, I suppose. They don’t necessarily need the higher grade ores and minerals they were trading for if we give the Kalee their starships, and until they get past the whole eating-the-eggs-of-other-sentient-species bit, it’s best that they’re not travelling the galaxy.”

“Be that as it may, you can’t strip a people of their rightful colonies, that’s not legal even if they’ve committed this kind of atrocity-“

“They _aren’t_ rightful colonies. They haven’t settled a single unoccupied moon or world outside their own solar system.” Obi-Wan explains. “The Kaleesh have records. Tovarski, Kirsk? All their settlements here are built on the ruins of a people that are now _extinct_ because of the Yam’rii. This was the species they hunted before they found Kalee.” The padawans face is grim and pained, and Ben wraps his presence around him, trying better to buffer him from the psychic input of the planet. Obi-Wan has good shields due to their intense training, stronger and denser and trickier than most his age, but he hasn’t learned yet how to cement them in his mind, he has to focus on them to keep them, and he can’t do that constantly. With those constructed shields down, Ben had torn right through his natural defenses.

Master Windu, Ambassador Soorn, and the Judicial Officers listening in are all dumbfounded by that revelation, but Master Windu recovers quickly.

“Very well then. The Jedi will stand by the Kalee in this.” He states. “But first, we have to stop the fighting here and now. “ He looks to the two warlords.

“We have agreed to be…lenient.” Lij Kummar spits lowly. “On the honor of our Ancestors.”

Windu looks to Yoda, who seems lost in thought, and that’s the last Ben sees before the world wobbles, and turns dark.

~*~

Qymaen Jai Sheelal, Warlord of the Kalee People, has long been held to be god-touched by his kin and clan and warriors. The Dreamer, they call him, after the vision that led him to the hunt that led him to Ronderu Lij Kummar, The Dreamt One, his heart-of-hearts.

This warrior, he thinks, is god-touched too.

All Jedi seem to carry the world around them as elders do, even their young do this, but this one – he does not carry the world. He carries death. Not as Jai Sheelal does, not in his hands and heart, but in a shroud that falls from his shoulders and buries the stars and has no end.

Jai Sheelal looks into his eyes and knows truth. _This man is my death. This man is my life._ This is the wisdom the Ancestors grant him, and he heeds it.

They do not let him join the fighting, when he wakes again. There are many others to fight, and he is wounded. His _padawan_ they do not let fight either, and Sheelal is glad. The child is brave, but not well, and not old enough for a blood-hunt besides.

When the fighting is done, they pull another being from its hiding place, a reptilian, with metallic red-orange eyes, and the Jedi tear strips from him with their words as he stutters and argues and denies and _lies_. They do not believe him, and Sheelal finds this good also.

Naasade, the warrior, watches that one, Bode, and his lip curls darkly.

“The Trade Federation should learn not to think they hold the Jedi on a leash.” He speaks with no hint of that snarl, voice cool and cutting. “They should learn we will not tolerate such abuse of power.”

Bode sneers back at him, and the warrior ignores his pretense of defiance. He is lying on the ground, sat up against a medical crate, his _padawan_ sitting _on_ the crate, hovering. He looks weak and ill, yet when he meets Jai Sheelal’s eye, Jai Sheelal sees not a man, but a _karabbac_ , a shadow of deadly teeth and glittering intelligence that hunts the ice-lands and is prey to none.

“You have many valuable resources now at your disposal, _Khagan_ Jai Sheelal. The Trade Federation, of which Delegate Bode represents, has great interest in those resources. It is why they supported the Yam’rii in subjugating your people, after all.” He says, and Bode sputters indignantly. Lij Kummar snarls in his direction, brandishing a blade, and Bode quells himself, though she will not act on the threat as she wants to, not with the Jedi near.

The Kalee People do not break their word.

“The Trading Clans do not have the reach of the Federation. They are many smaller kin-groups, and they cannot be as generous as the Trade Federation, but they… possess certain qualities that others severely lack. If it is agreeable to your people, the Jedi, and _I_ personally, would be more than happy to send some of them your way.” Naasade offers smoothly.

Jai Sheelal turns to Lij Kummar, for he has not the best grasp of the other language, but she shows understanding, and approval, and so he agrees.

Naasade’s pleased smile is a _karabbac_ smile.


End file.
